Piercy Ravenstone: a study in nineteenth century radical economics

Between 1820 and 1840, there arose in England a small school of economic thought, intensely anti-capitalistic, known as the Ricardian socialists. Their basic idea was the laborers' right to their whole product. One somewhat obscure member of this group was Piercy Ravenstone who wrote A Few Doubts on the Subjects of Population and Political Economy in 1821 and Thoughts on the Funding System and Its Effects in 1824. In this thesis, I have put forth Ravenstone's system in detail by thoroughly examining both of his works. His basic approach is to demolish the Malthusian population theory, putting in its place a theory which shows that exploitation through rent, taxes and profit is the cause of worker misery. Before examining Ravenstone's work, I have described the historical events which led to early socialist ideology and have given a general overview of Ricardian socialism and its connection with the more classical economics. Profiles of the 2 more well-known members of the school are given and thoughts of Karl Marx on the work of these men are briefly discussed. The conclusion reached is that Ravenstone was not a true socialist but rather was somewhat right-wing. Although he shared many socialist criticisms of capitalist society, he espoused a society of individual workers in both manufacturing and agriculture rather than Owenist establishments or communism.

Name thesis:degree_name

Master of Arts

Level thesis:degree_level

masters

Discipline thesis:degree_discipline

Economics

Department dc:contributor.department

Economics

Grantor dc:publisher

Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University

Year dc:date.issued

1970

Author dc:creator

• Miles, John Jeffries

• Ravenstone, Piercy

Statement dc:rights

• In Copyright

Licence dc:rights.uri

• http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/

Language dc:language.iso

en_US

Handle dc:identifier.uri

http://hdl.handle.net/10919/64593

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:vtechworks.lib.vt.edu:10919/64593